Soaring fees 'risk pricing middle-class parents out of private schools'

The private sector may be "in danger of pricing itself out of the market", a study has warned, with fees as high as £25,000 a year for boarders and £16,000 a year for day pupils.

For more than ten years, British independent schools have seen pupil numbers grow - but the bubble could soon burst with parents simply unable to pay the sky-high rates, the report warned.

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Between the end of 2001 and the end of 2006, average fees rose by 39 per cent, against an 18 per cent rise in average earnings.

Parents in "managerial and professional" jobs, who are more likely to send their children to private school, saw their salaries rise by less than that, at an average of 15 per cent.

A report by Mtmconsulting, which advises independent schools on business strategy, said the sector may have "reached the limit of parents' ability to afford fees".

It said schools would have to curb rates or see pupil numbers fall further.

This could lead to a vicious circle, as among the reasons for the rise in fees are ever-decreasing class sizes in independent schools.

Many parents want their children to benefit from smaller classes of around ten pupils, but this also means paying for more teachers.

Top-class facilities such as sports centres, performing-arts theatres and music schools, as well as constant updating of computer systems, have also driven up fees.

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Another theory is that the surge in fees has been partly caused by a rise in the number of overseas students from wealthy backgrounds who now attend British private schools.

The proportion is as high as 30 per cent in some schools, but it is feared their ability to pay extortionate fees allows schools to push prices up.

However, there is a feeling the "ceiling has also been reached", as greater numbers of foreign pupils could change schools' character, said a spokesman for the report.

Gavin Humphries, the report's author, said he believed pupil numbers could fall by at least 5 per cent if the rise in fees was not curbed.

Both the number of boarding pupils and those attending single-sex girls' schools have already declined in the past five years.

Last October, it was reported that inflation-busting fee rises had already made independent schools unaffordable for most single-income families.

According to the report, the 14 per cent of parents who come from outside the "heartland" of professional and managerial classes would be most vulnerable to being priced out if the trend continued.

"The figure would be higher if there are problems in the economy in general or in London's financial services sector in particular," said Mr Humphries.

"The most pressing scenario facing the sector is therefore one of cost-cutting."